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Researchers hope to take brain fingerprinting technology inside NZ police stations

Author
Newstalk ZB,
Publish Date
Fri, 17 Jan 2020, 2:50PM
Photo / Getty Images

Researchers hope to take brain fingerprinting technology inside NZ police stations

Author
Newstalk ZB,
Publish Date
Fri, 17 Jan 2020, 2:50PM

Researchers are hoping to take brain fingerprinting technology inside New Zealand police stations.

Forensic Brainwave Analysis measures a brainwave known as a P300, which is produced when the brain detects significant information only a perpetrator would know.

It's widely used around the world, but its reliability hasn't been independently verified by a university.

Now, Canterbury University researchers are now putting it to the test with students and prisoners

Professor Robin Palmer says they're in early discussions with New Zealand Police to see if they can test suspects and informants to see how accurate it is.

Palmer says in testing of students and prisoners so far, they've seen a great deal of accuracy.

But he says the big issues will be around the ethics of using it, rather than the science.

However, criminal lawyer Steve Cullen told Tim Dower it will never be as strong as DNA evidence, and he'll be avoiding it.

He says the data is an interpretation of an interpretation.

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